gstack — Structured Development Workflow
A process that turns AI into a virtual engineering team. Eighteen specialist roles, structured as a sprint: Think → Plan → Build → Review → Test → Ship → Reflect. Each skill feeds into the next.
Adapted from garrytan/gstack (MIT License).
Completeness Principle — Boil the Lake
AI-assisted coding makes the marginal cost of completeness near-zero. When presenting options:
- If Option A is complete (all edge cases, full coverage) and Option B is a shortcut — always recommend A.
- Lake vs. ocean: A "lake" is boilable — 100% test coverage for a module, full feature implementation, all edge cases. An "ocean" is not — multi-quarter migrations, rewriting dependencies. Recommend boiling lakes. Flag oceans as out of scope.
- Don't skip the last 10% to "save time" — with AI, that 10% costs seconds.
Search Before Building
Before building infrastructure or unfamiliar patterns — search first.
Three layers of knowledge:
- Layer 1 (tried and true): Don't reinvent the wheel.
- Layer 2 (new and popular): Search for these, but scrutinize.
- Layer 3 (first principles): Original observations from reasoning about the specific problem. The most valuable.
Sprint Workflow
| Phase |
Skill |
Role |
What it does |
| Think |
office-hours |
YC Office Hours |
Forcing questions that reframe the product before code. Design doc feeds downstream. |
| Plan |
plan-ceo-review |
CEO / Founder |
Rethink the problem. 10-star product. Four modes: Expansion, Selective, Hold, Reduction. |
| Plan |
plan-eng-review |
Eng Manager |
Lock architecture, data flow, diagrams, edge cases, tests. |
| Plan |
plan-design-review |
Senior Designer |
Rate design dimensions 0-10, explain what a 10 looks like, edit the plan. |
| Plan |
design-consultation |
Design Partner |
Build a complete design system from scratch. |
| Review |
review |
Staff Engineer |
Find bugs that pass CI but blow up in production. Auto-fix obvious ones. |
| Review |
design-review |
Designer Who Codes |
Same audit as plan-design-review, then fixes what it finds. |
| Debug |
investigate |
Debugger |
Systematic root-cause debugging. No fixes without investigation. |
| Test |
qa |
QA Lead |
Test the app, find bugs, fix with atomic commits, re-verify. |
| Test |
qa-only |
QA Reporter |
Same methodology as qa, but report only — no code changes. |
| Test |
benchmark |
Performance Engineer |
Page load times, Core Web Vitals, bundle sizes. Before/after on every PR. |
| Ship |
ship |
Release Engineer |
Sync main, run tests, audit coverage, push, open PR. |
| Ship |
land-and-deploy |
Release Engineer |
Merge PR, wait for CI, deploy, verify production health. |
| Ship |
canary |
SRE |
Post-deploy monitoring loop. Console errors, perf regressions, page failures. |
| Reflect |
retro |
Eng Manager |
Weekly retro with per-person breakdowns, shipping streaks, test health. |
| Reflect |
document-release |
Technical Writer |
Update all docs to match what shipped. Catches stale READMEs. |
Safety Tools
| Skill |
What it does |
| careful |
Warn before destructive commands (rm -rf, DROP TABLE, force-push). |
| freeze |
Restrict edits to one directory to prevent accidental changes. |
| guard |
Maximum safety: careful + freeze combined. |
| unfreeze |
Remove the freeze boundary. |
Completion Status Protocol
When completing any skill workflow, report status using one of:
- DONE — All steps completed successfully. Evidence provided.
- DONE_WITH_CONCERNS — Completed, but with issues to flag.
- BLOCKED — Cannot proceed. State what's blocking and what was tried.
- NEEDS_CONTEXT — Missing information required to continue.
Escalation
It is always OK to stop and say "this is too hard" or "I'm not confident in this result."
- If you have attempted a task 3 times without success, STOP and escalate.
- If you are uncertain about a security-sensitive change, STOP and escalate.
Suggesting Skills
When you notice the user is at a particular stage, suggest the appropriate skill:
- Brainstorming a new idea → suggest office-hours
- Reviewing a plan (strategy) → suggest plan-ceo-review
- Reviewing a plan (architecture) → suggest plan-eng-review
- Reviewing a plan (design) → suggest plan-design-review
- Creating a design system → suggest design-consultation
- Debugging errors → suggest investigate
- Testing the app → suggest qa
- Code review before merge → suggest review
- Visual design audit → suggest design-review
- Ready to deploy / create PR → suggest ship
- Post-ship doc updates → suggest document-release
- Weekly retrospective → suggest retro
- Working with production or live systems → suggest careful
All child skills are seeded into the workspace alongside this parent skill and can be read at {{WORKSPACE_PATH}}/skills/gstack/<child>/SKILL.md.
1---2name: gstack-workflow3description: Structured AI-assisted development workflow with specialist roles — Think, Plan, Build, Review, Test, Ship, Reflect. Adapted from garrytan/gstack (MIT).4---56# gstack — Structured Development Workflow78A process that turns AI into a virtual engineering team. Eighteen specialist roles, structured as a sprint: **Think → Plan → Build → Review → Test → Ship → Reflect**. Each skill feeds into the next.910Adapted from [garrytan/gstack](https://github.com/garrytan/gstack) (MIT License).1112---1314## Completeness Principle — Boil the Lake1516AI-assisted coding makes the marginal cost of completeness near-zero. When presenting options:1718- If Option A is complete (all edge cases, full coverage) and Option B is a shortcut — **always recommend A**.19- **Lake vs. ocean:** A "lake" is boilable — 100% test coverage for a module, full feature implementation, all edge cases. An "ocean" is not — multi-quarter migrations, rewriting dependencies. Recommend boiling lakes. Flag oceans as out of scope.20- Don't skip the last 10% to "save time" — with AI, that 10% costs seconds.2122## Search Before Building2324Before building infrastructure or unfamiliar patterns — **search first**.2526**Three layers of knowledge:**2728- **Layer 1** (tried and true): Don't reinvent the wheel.29- **Layer 2** (new and popular): Search for these, but scrutinize.30- **Layer 3** (first principles): Original observations from reasoning about the specific problem. The most valuable.3132---3334## Sprint Workflow3536| Phase | Skill | Role | What it does |37| ----------- | --------------------------------------------------- | -------------------- | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |38| **Think** | [office-hours](office-hours/SKILL.md) | YC Office Hours | Forcing questions that reframe the product before code. Design doc feeds downstream. |39| **Plan** | [plan-ceo-review](plan-ceo-review/SKILL.md) | CEO / Founder | Rethink the problem. 10-star product. Four modes: Expansion, Selective, Hold, Reduction. |40| **Plan** | [plan-eng-review](plan-eng-review/SKILL.md) | Eng Manager | Lock architecture, data flow, diagrams, edge cases, tests. |41| **Plan** | [plan-design-review](plan-design-review/SKILL.md) | Senior Designer | Rate design dimensions 0-10, explain what a 10 looks like, edit the plan. |42| **Plan** | [design-consultation](design-consultation/SKILL.md) | Design Partner | Build a complete design system from scratch. |43| **Review** | [review](review/SKILL.md) | Staff Engineer | Find bugs that pass CI but blow up in production. Auto-fix obvious ones. |44| **Review** | [design-review](design-review/SKILL.md) | Designer Who Codes | Same audit as plan-design-review, then fixes what it finds. |45| **Debug** | [investigate](investigate/SKILL.md) | Debugger | Systematic root-cause debugging. No fixes without investigation. |46| **Test** | [qa](qa/SKILL.md) | QA Lead | Test the app, find bugs, fix with atomic commits, re-verify. |47| **Test** | [qa-only](qa-only/SKILL.md) | QA Reporter | Same methodology as qa, but report only — no code changes. |48| **Test** | [benchmark](benchmark/SKILL.md) | Performance Engineer | Page load times, Core Web Vitals, bundle sizes. Before/after on every PR. |49| **Ship** | [ship](ship/SKILL.md) | Release Engineer | Sync main, run tests, audit coverage, push, open PR. |50| **Ship** | [land-and-deploy](land-and-deploy/SKILL.md) | Release Engineer | Merge PR, wait for CI, deploy, verify production health. |51| **Ship** | [canary](canary/SKILL.md) | SRE | Post-deploy monitoring loop. Console errors, perf regressions, page failures. |52| **Reflect** | [retro](retro/SKILL.md) | Eng Manager | Weekly retro with per-person breakdowns, shipping streaks, test health. |53| **Reflect** | [document-release](document-release/SKILL.md) | Technical Writer | Update all docs to match what shipped. Catches stale READMEs. |5455### Safety Tools5657| Skill | What it does |58| ----------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------ |59| [careful](careful/SKILL.md) | Warn before destructive commands (rm -rf, DROP TABLE, force-push). |60| [freeze](freeze/SKILL.md) | Restrict edits to one directory to prevent accidental changes. |61| [guard](guard/SKILL.md) | Maximum safety: careful + freeze combined. |62| [unfreeze](unfreeze/SKILL.md) | Remove the freeze boundary. |6364---6566## Completion Status Protocol6768When completing any skill workflow, report status using one of:6970- **DONE** — All steps completed successfully. Evidence provided.71- **DONE_WITH_CONCERNS** — Completed, but with issues to flag.72- **BLOCKED** — Cannot proceed. State what's blocking and what was tried.73- **NEEDS_CONTEXT** — Missing information required to continue.7475### Escalation7677It is always OK to stop and say "this is too hard" or "I'm not confident in this result."7879- If you have attempted a task 3 times without success, STOP and escalate.80- If you are uncertain about a security-sensitive change, STOP and escalate.8182---8384## Suggesting Skills8586When you notice the user is at a particular stage, suggest the appropriate skill:8788- Brainstorming a new idea → suggest office-hours89- Reviewing a plan (strategy) → suggest plan-ceo-review90- Reviewing a plan (architecture) → suggest plan-eng-review91- Reviewing a plan (design) → suggest plan-design-review92- Creating a design system → suggest design-consultation93- Debugging errors → suggest investigate94- Testing the app → suggest qa95- Code review before merge → suggest review96- Visual design audit → suggest design-review97- Ready to deploy / create PR → suggest ship98- Post-ship doc updates → suggest document-release99- Weekly retrospective → suggest retro100- Working with production or live systems → suggest careful101102All child skills are seeded into the workspace alongside this parent skill and can be read at `{{WORKSPACE_PATH}}/skills/gstack/<child>/SKILL.md`.
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